SISTEMAS DE BIODIGESTIÓN INDUSTRIALES (MATADEROS)

The Mechanics and Farmers Bank (M&F) owed its existence to several important developments. In February 1907, Dr. Manassa Thomas Pope, a black doctor from Raleigh and Shaw University's Professor Edward A. Johnson met with black businessmen in Durham. They tried to convince the leaders to set-up a building and loan association in the city. Once

203 _{Interview with John Hervey Wheeler by Robert Penn Warren, June 30, 1964, original interview transcript}

can be accessed online at “Robert Penn Warren’s Who Speaks for the Negro?: an Archival Collection,” http://whospeaks.library.vanderbilt.edu/sites/default/files/RPW.reel_.3.T.H.%20Wheeler.pgs _.968-

1001.doc.pdf, 2; audio version also available through “Robert Penn Warren’s Who Speaks for the Negro?: an Archival Collection,” http://whospeaks.library.vanderbilt.edu/interview/john-hervey-wheeler.

204_{Kristin B. Mallegg, ed., Who's Who Among African Americans, 20th ed. (Detroit: Gale, 2007),}

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the group assembled it became evident they had no interest in a loan association, but several men wanted a bank instead. In fact, entrepreneurs Richard B. Fitzgerald and William G. Pearson had the inkling to open-up such a financial institution. The two even broached the idea to NCM president John A. Merrick at least two years earlier, but Merrick did not heartily endorse the proposal. However, after meeting with Pope and Johnson the black leaders in Durham quickly formed a bank.205

In the meantime, Fitzgerald and pharmacist turned educator Dr. James E. Shepard drafted the bank’s initial charter. After meeting on several other occasions Fitzgerald, Shepard, Pearson, Warren, and Dr. J. A. Dodson all put down an initial investment comprising the bank’s stock; both Merrick and Dr. Aaron M. Moore both became early shareholders. In all, they raised approximately $10,000 and then took the steps toward official incorporation. On February 25, 1907, the North Carolina General Assembly granted a charter to the previously mentioned investors.206 M&F’s establishment gave the Tar Heel State its third bank “owned, lock stock and barrel by colored people.”207 The bank's formation represented a natural progression given the black business community's size and scope. “Often,” explained historian Juliet E. K. Walker, “black insurance companies preceded the founding of black banks.” The emergence of financial institutions such as M&F “were not only symbols of the increased financial holdings of blacks but also an

205

R. McCants Andrews John Merrick: A Biographical Sketch (Durham: Seeman Printery, 1920), 50-55,

http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/andrews/andrews.html; William K. Boyd, The Story of Durham: City of the New South (Durham: Duke University Press, 1925), 288-299; Lassiter, Hans Dominique, "A History of Mechanics and Farmers Bank, 1908-1969" M.A. thesis, North Carolina Central University, 2000, 5-7.

206_Ibid.

207_{"Negroes Open Bank: Owned, Lock, Stock and Barrel by Colored People—As a White Paper Sees Them,"}

Afro-American, August 22, 1908; "Mechanics and Farmers Bank Enters 20th Successful Year," unidentified newspaper, 1918, William Gaston Pearson Papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Books & Manuscript Library, Duke University.

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expression of defiance to white attempts to impose a separate and subordinate status on America’s citizens of African descent.”208

In August 1908, M&F opened for business, barely one month after the Wheeler family moved to Durham. The incorporators located the bank's headquarters in the building owned by the black fraternal order the Royal Knights of King David located on Parrish Street. After the bank’s first meeting in July, Fitzgerald, Dodson, Pearson, Merrick, Shepard, Spaulding, Stevens, Moore, and Warren became the bank's inaugural board of directors. The board elected Fitzgerald as the institution’s first president, alongside vice president John Merrick and William Pearson as cashier.209 During M&F's first week in operation, it received assistance from bank managers at the city’s white banks. J. B. Mason from the Citizens National Bank “came over each day for a week…and showed them [M&F managers] how to open and close the bank.”210

Already bolstered by NCM's economic success, the bank was destined to become another link in the chain of black economic achievement in Durham and the New South.

Between 1908 and 1929, M&F rose to prominence among the nation’s leading black- owned banks. M&F’s leadership—its officers and board members—consisted of the same individuals responsible for NCM's growth and expansion.211 M&F’s first president Richard B. Fitzgerald, an original NCM founder, made his fortune as a skilled brick maker in

208

Juliet E. K. Walker, The History of Black Business in America: Capitalism, Race, Entrepreneurship (New York: Macmillan Library Reference USA, 1998), 190, 193.

209_{R. McCants Andrews, John Merrick: A Biographical Sketch, 50-55; Hans Dominique Lassiter, "A History of}

Mechanics and Farmers Bank, 1908-1969," M.A. thesis, North Carolina Central University, 2000, 5-7; William K. Boyd, The Story of Durham, City of the New South, 288-289; Jean Bradley Anderson, Durham County, 256- 257; Walter B. Weare, Black Business in the New South, 81.

210_{“Leaders of Both Races Celebrate 20th Anniversary Mechanics-Farmers Bank,”}

Norfolk Journal and Guide, August 11, 1928.

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Durham, after starting his company soon after emancipation; he became the “largest brick manufacturer in Durham County.”212 The bank’s cashier, William Pearson also helped found NCM. Pearson, a prominent educator and businessman, also became principal at the black Hillside Park High School. By the 1920s, Pearson helped start several other businesses associated with the NCM and M&F including the Bankers Fire Insurance Company and the Southern Fidelity and Surety Company. Pearson merged his commitment to business with responsibility to community; he also vied for full citizenship on blacks' behalf, while he modeled black business activism.213 Other board members (Dodson, Shepard, Spaulding, Stevens, Moore, and Warren) did well for themselves financially before becoming bankers. Moore and Spaulding, the uncle and nephew duo made up the NCM “triumvirate,” the management team credited with the company’s early “success and survival.”214

In as much as M&F’s leadership came from NCM's ranks, that same leadership made community involvement a main priority through civic leadership. John Merrick followed in the philosophical tradition most identifiable with Booker T. Washington, where he counseled blacks to avoid politics. Merrick once remarked, “ ‘A man goes into politics a good man and [then] he goes to pulling the wires and soon is classed a politician.’ ” “ ‘What difference does it make to us who is elected?’ ” asked Merrick. “ ‘We got to serve in the same different

212

William K. Boyd, The Story of Durham, 291; Walter B. Weare, Black Business in the New South, 43; Leslie Brown, Upbuilding Black Durham, 115-116; Dolores E. Janiewski, Sisterhood Denied, 79.

213_{Obituary of William Gaston Pearson, September 25, 1947, William Gaston Pearson Papers, David M.}

Rubenstein Rare Books & Manuscript Library, Duke University; "Chronological Summary of Specific W. G. Pearson Achievments," William Gaston Pearson Papers; R. McCants Andrews, John Merrick: A Biography, 44- 46; "The Royal Knights of King David Historical Sketch," Willliam Gaston Pearson Papers, 4, 10-17;

"Mechanics and Farmers Bank Enters 20th Successful Year," unidentified newspaper, 1918, William Gaston Pearson Papers.

214_{Walter B. Weare, Black Business in the New South, 29; Leslie Brown, Upbuilding Black Durham, 115-116;}

98 capacities of life for a living.’ ”215

Despite Merrick’s insistence here, he and his colleagues stood at the forefront in civic leadership in Durham and across North Carolina from the beginning of M&F and NCM's establishment. Dr. Aaron M. Moore held a deep and notable interest in black education, which led to significant contributions in that area. He became secretary-treasurer for the Rural School Extension Department for the North Carolina Teachers Association. During World War I, Moore served as the Special Agent and Supervisor of Negro Economics with the War Department in North Carolina. Most people described Moore as a “silent thinker” and a “philosopher.”216

Charles C. Spaulding was born to former slaves on August 1, 1874 in Columbus County, North Carolina. He came to Durham in 1894 after intercepting a letter that his uncle Dr. Moore intended for his brother, which recommended the elder sibling come to Durham at once. Spaulding gained the nickname “Mr. Co-Operation,” several reasons. “Well,” as Spaulding himself explained, “co-operation brings organization, efficient organization brings success, and success alone inspires confidence and understanding.” “I tell the young people,” Spaulding exclaimed, “that life has to be lived out, not with money, not with machines, but with people. And I mean not only with other people of our own race but with the members of the white race—in fact, here in the South. I mean especially that.”217 Spaulding firmly believed it to be “foolish…to talk about granting equality, except equality

215_{William K. Boyd, The Story of Durham, 282-283.}

216_{"Death Claims Dr A. M. Moore at His Durham Home," Norfolk Journal and Guide, May 5, 1923; Asa T.}

Spaulding interview by Walter B. Weare, interview transcript, 15.

217_{Archibald Rutledge, “The Call Him ‘Co-Operation,”}

The Mutual, reprinted from the The Saturday Evening Post,” March 27, 1943, C. C. Spaulding Vertical File, Stanford L. Warren Library, Durham, North Carolina; C.

C. Spaulding, "Pioneer Insurancemen, Bankers Hailed"; "Business Tycoon Died on Date of 78th Birthday," The Carolinian, August 9, 1952.

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of opportunity.” He had no formal education, yet he encouraged blacks interested in business to attend college and learn scientific business practices.

During the 1920s, M&F’s economic rise became most evident. By then the bank assembled a financially savvy group of employees. The bank's leadership by that time included board chairman Dr. Stanford L. Warren, president C.C. Spaulding, vice president Richard McDougald, second vice president Edward Merrick, third vice president Dr. Clyde Donell (the Harvard trained medical doctor), fifth vice president Brittain Pearce, and cashier W. H. Wilson; James M. Avery became the institution's trust officer. In early1922, M&F merged with the Fraternal Bank and Trust Company, a bank founded by William Pearson in 1920. With the two banks now consolidated, M&F strengthened its overall assets to about $633,000. The consolidation helped position M&F as a frontrunner among black banks in North Carolina and among the most profitable black banks in the country.218 In January 1923, M&F expanded its holdings when it opened a second branch in Raleigh. The Raleigh branch opened with approximately $115,749.95, which brought M&F's general resources to $650,000. Charles R. Frazier, a former dean at Shaw University, became the branch manager.219 By 1927, the Raleigh branch reported “loans and discounts” at $623,833.56 and embarked on a $50,000.00, two months-long deposit campaign.220 In a January 1925 article, the black Norfolk Journal and Guide reported that black enterprises in Durham looked “forward to [a] year of prosperity,” as they hosted a conclave to re-organize the local

218_{"Durham Bank's Consolidate," Norfolk Journal and Guide, March 4, 1922.}

219

"Another Race Bank for North Carolina," Norfolk Journal and Guide, January 20, 1923.

220_{"50,000 Deposits Drive By Farmers Mechanics Bank [M&F]," Norfolk Journal and Guide, February 5, 1927.}

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National Negro Business League (NNBL) branch, an organization founded by Booker T. Washington in 1900.221

As M&F made considerable economic progress, the larger black banking world formed a professional organization known as the National Negro Bankers Association (NNBA). The idea for the NNBA came from Major Richard R. Wright, a former educator from Georgia who served as president at the Citizens and Southern Bank and Trust Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1920, Wright opened his Citizens and Southern Bank after witnessing the black community’s dollars continuously pass from their hands and into white hands while “ ‘building up businesses’ ” that “ ‘discriminate[d] against our people.’ ”222 The origins for the NNBA also dated back to 1906 a NNBL affiliate, but the organization ceased to exist after 1916.223

In 1924, black bankers again used the NNBL’s annual meeting in Cleveland, Ohio to convene a session that ended with the NNBA's reorganization. As detailed by historian Alexa Benson Henderson, the bankers believed “strong banks were essential to the economic progress of African Americans.”224

In 1926, the NNBA organized their own separate meeting in Philadelphia where M&F president C. C. Spaulding gave the keynote address and urged “cooperation” between a reported seventy black banks in operation throughout the

221_{"Big Business Ventures Plan 1925 Campaign," Norfolk Journal and Guide, January 10, 1925; “Pioneer}

Insurancemen, Bankers Hailed,” unidentified newspaper article in the C. C. Spaulding vertical file, Stanford L. Warren Library, Durham, North Carolina; Juliet E. K. Walker, The History of Black Business in America: Capitalism, Race, Entrepreneurship, 184.

222

Alexa Benson Henderson, “Richard R. Wright and the National Negro Bankers Association: Early

Organizing Efforts among Black Bankers, 1924-1942” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. 117, No. ½ (Jan.-Apr., 1993), 54.

223

Ibid.

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country. He told the bankers in attendance that they needed to “ ‘pull together and make openings for [their] young men and women, and serve the race.’ ”225 Before the meeting ended the bankers selected Wright to be president, Wilson Lovett of First Standard Bank in Louisville, Kentucky as secretary and Spaulding became treasurer.226 The NNBA's formation coincided with the move by blacks in other fields to create their own organizations in order to strengthen professional standards. In addition to the NNBA, the other groups included the National Association of Negro Insurance Companies, the National Association of Funeral Directors, the National Association of Real Estate Dealers, the National Bar Association, the National Press Association and the Colored Undertakers and Embalmers Association.227

Since the NNBA’s inception, Spaulding and M&F played a vital role in the organization’s development and ultimate survival. In fact, between September 15 and 16, 1927, M&F hosted the second annual NNBA convention. Durham by that time also had prestige as “ ‘the financial center of Aframerica’ ”228 The NNBA made its concern the “economic advancement of our group” and therefore “effective mobilization of the money- power of the race.” It wanted to solve the problem of “the unorganized Negro money- power.” M&F casher Richard L. McDougald had the responsibility to make local arrangements for the gathering. By the time of the Durham meeting the organization's membership increased to fifty-five member banks. The bankers in attendance that year

225

Ibid., 59.

226_{Ibid., 60.}

227

Juliette E. K. Walker, The History of Black Business in America, 312.

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received a first-hand lookat how Durham’s black businesses operated. They also traveled to Raleigh to visit Shaw University and M&F's branch there.229

There are many individuals than can be credited with M&F's economic advancement between 1908 and 1929. However, the bank's history cannot be discussed without mentioning Richard Lewis McDougald who became bookkeeper in 1919; by 1923, he became the bank’s vice president and cashier. He was born on April 11, 1896 in Whiteville, North Carolina in a family that included ten children to parents Richard and Ida Virginia Moore McDougald. He spent his childhood growing up in New York where he completed a year of high school. From there, McDougald enlisted in the United States Air Force and served the country in World War I. After the war, the military veteran returned to his home state and enrolled at the National Religions Training School and Chatauqua where he graduated. Along with his employment at M&F, McDougald helped found other important financial institutions in Durham also linked to M&F and NCM. Most notably, he helped establish the Mutual Building and Loan Association (MB&LA) in 1921 and had a prominent role in the Southern Fidelity and Surety Company. He started the MB&LA to educate blacks about " ' the importance of owning their own homes.' " Moreover, the company "aimed for the [black] masses, selling its 'shares' at twenty-five cents each. These shares were converted into saving certificates akin to bonds which matured in 333 weeks. McDougald calculated that such a program would enable the black worker to accumulate a down payment on a home and then, of course, borrow the balance from the Association."230 He also became an

229_{"National Negro Bankers' Association," Norfolk Journal and Guide, July 23, 1927; "Negro Bankers Meet in}

Durham," Norfolk Journal and Guide, August 6, 1927; "National Negro Bankers Ass'n to Meet in Durham,"

Pittsburgh Courier, August 13, 1927; "National Bankers Meet in Louisville Session," Baltimore Afro- American, September 22, 1928.

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officer and board member at the Bankers Fire Insurance Company; in the early 1920s, he had a hand in expanding the Merrick-McDougald-Wilson Company—later the Union Insurance and Realty Company—and in 1929 he started the Mortgage Company of Durham. The entrepreneur had a special knack for business and before joining the military, he worked as a Wall Street “runner.” McDougald had “very fair [skinned]; he was often mistaken for white,” remembered Asa Spaulding. “You couldn't tell him from being white,” Spaulding continued, “And a lot of people in Durham didn't know he was not white.” However, “he never would [try] to pass for white.” In fact, “it was an insult to consider him as white” and “he made no bones about it any time, that he was a Negro.”231

In August 1928, M&F celebrated its twentieth year anniversary and the bank’s total resources were at $800,000.232 North Carolina's lieutenant governor Jacob Elmer Long attended that year’s observance. Long told the celebrants that in Durham they “could not have any better leaders” and that “the State of North Carolina [was] exceedingly proud of [their] institution.” Despite the bank’s success during the previous two decades, M&F president C. C. Spaulding relayed that they “were not going to get the big head,” but would “keep our feet on the ground.” Spaulding’s assurance in the above instance correlated with the bank’s cautious banking practices, which most observers gave as reasons for the

231_{Obituary of R. L. McDougald, October 5, 1944, courtesy of North Carolina Central University archivist}

Andre D. Vann; “Death Claims R. L. McDougald,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, October 7, 1944; Asa

Spaulding interview April 16, 1979, transcript, 8; Walter B. Weare, Black Business in the New South, 121-123; "Will 'The Town that Co-Operation Built' Hold its Own?: Will Durham Continue the Seat of Negro Business?"

Pittsburgh Courier, October 26, 1929.

232_{"Harlem Suffering from Too Much Pleasure," Pittsburgh Courier, December 24, 1927; "Leaders of Both}